The present invention relates to generally to circuit board connectors, and more particularly to circuit board connectors for peripheral devices.
Many connectors for circuit boards are known in the art. One such conventional electrical connector is used on a circuit board or mother board used in a computer and it includes an insulative housing having a plurality of terminals mounted therein and a metal grounding shell surrounding the connector housing. The terminals have tail portions formed thereon that are connected to selected circuits formed on the printed circuit board. The metal shell has legs for fixing the connector to the circuit board. The connector has an inlet that accommodates an opposing electrical connector on its front side, thereby permitting the wires of the opposing connector to be electrically connected to selected conductors of the circuit.
This type of connector is designed for close attachment to the circuit board with the bottom of the connector upon the upper surface of the circuit board, and thus places the connector inlet parallel to the upper surface of the printed circuit board. With this structure, it is necessary that the connector is positioned on the circuit board in an area that has enough space to permit an opposing connector to be laid ahead of the connector to permit the coupling and decoupling of the opposing connector to and from the connector that is fixed to the printed circuit board. This is disadvantageous from the standpoint of making the most effective use of the limited space available on the circuit mother board. It also significantly prevents a reduction in size of the electronic device.
Such a circuit board connector is commonly used in computers by connecting a peripheral device, such as a video camera or other device to the computer circuit board. Because such connectors require a predetermined space in front of them to effect such a connection, these known connectors are located at the rear of the computer and the connection point for the peripheral device is at the rear of the computer. This necessitates the user to reach around to the rear of the computer to make the connection, which is not always feasible.